Your Word: Who Dat gonna take the symbols of New Orleans?

The National Football League has sent cease-and-desist letters to New Orleans area shopowners demanding that these small, local stores stop selling locally-created merchandise featuring the Saints’ fleur-de-lis or the phrase "Who Dat," citing trademark violations.

It is clearly debatable whether the NFL has a legitimate point about use of the fleur-de-lis, a several hundred-years-old symbol ubiquitous to New Orleans since long before the Saints began in 1967.

As for "Who Dat," the cheer began as a call-and-response component in early jazz that remained in the local African-American culture. It was brought into football by fans of Mississippi Valley black colleges in the 1960s and 1970s and ultimately to the Saints (by fans) in the late 1970s.

But in a demonstration of how the NFL’s greed knows no boundaries, the timing of the demand to cease something that local shops have always done in New Orleans — a place where the city, the residents and the culture of its football team have merged entirely — couldn’t be more objectionable.

Economic recovery in New Orleans has been slow, but it has been gaining momentum in recent months.

The city and its economy of local businesses are enjoying a much-needed shot of commercial activity.

The NFL may ultimately be right about the fleur-de-lis and the "Who Dat" cheer, and the affected local New Orleans businesses are going to have to respect the law.

But if after the proper process, the NFL is found to be wrong, the losses suffered by these local New Orleans businesses will never be recovered after the fact.

The fact that the NFL is either oblivious to this possibility and the damage it would cause, or it just doesn’t care, is offensive.

The fleur-de-lis is a symbol of New Orleans — and was long before the Saints adopted it in the late 1960s.

And "Who Dat" was a phrase of the people, long before those same fans decided to use the phrase in support of the Saints.

Kelly Love of Wilmer is a marketing consultant. Reared in the New Orleans area, he is a lifelong Saints fan.The Press-Register welcomes reader submissions for "Your Word" on topics of general interest. They should contain about 650 words and be mailed to "Your Word," P.O. Box 2488, Mobile, Ala. 36652 or sent via e-mail to letters@press-register.com.